


elegance isn't always in the script.

by orphan_account



Series: crooked handwriting [2]
Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: M/M, Remind me why I thought this was a good idea, basically journal entries, canonverse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-21
Updated: 2015-03-18
Packaged: 2018-03-08 11:22:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 12
Words: 1,909
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3207362
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>this <strike>journal</strike> <em>piece of shit notebook belongs to:</em></p><p><em>levi ackerman</em><br/>.<br/>.<br/>.<br/>Eren found the journal seven days—a week, after the Captain had passed.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. title page//to eren

this ~~journal~~ _piece of shit notebook belongs to:_

_levi ackerman_

> notes of the owner:
> 
> _this is for you, kid. I hope you find it one day._
> 
> _love,_
> 
> _levi_
> 
>  _post script—I lied in my letter, Eren. This was my first venture into the personal._


	2. alright

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _i'd become alright with that._

> _
> 
> I. 
> 
> i can't figure it out
> 
> why it is you stay in this cramped up room, in my lumped bed, awake 'till the early hours of the morning—when everyone should have long been dead to the world. 
> 
> yet you stay, fingers carding through my hair like it is natural—and for a few moments, I believed it was. 
> 
> clean. 
> 
> i was not a shell, and you were more than a boy. In those moments, I was, and am free of everything aside from you, and what scared me the most—
> 
> was that I had become alright with that.
> 
> _


	3. regret

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _not for a second._

> _
> 
> II.
> 
> it wasn't supposed to be like this, you know? 
> 
> you weren't supposed to have come back. 
> 
> you weren't supposed to have pinned me to the wall—my arms above my head, asking me to choose. Pleading with me to accept or reject you.
> 
> i didn't think someone with as much light—bright eyes, wide smile that turned up the corners of your cheeks—would want a dark fleck that reflected nothing other than obsidian. 
> 
> in that moment, i was not in control. you were, eren—had control of me. 
> 
> i thought, I knew, that opposites attracted if what I had seen in you amounted to anything other than my eyes playing tricks. 
> 
> I kissed you, then.
> 
> and I have never regretted it.
> 
> not for a second.
> 
> _


	4. knowing

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _because I knew then, that I loved you too._

> _
> 
> III.
> 
> only has been a month since then, and i am unaware as to how you found out about my birthday—
> 
> how you smuggled the funny smelling soaps into my tub without my noticing. 
> 
> 'floral,' you'd said—that silly smile lighting up your face. 
> 
> and it was. . interesting—the way you insisted on climbing in behind, wrapping your arms around me as if tomorrow was not guaranteed.
> 
> when I turned to see your smile, I had to remind myself, then, that it was not.
> 
> i would take as much as I could get, of you. I was greedy, then. And I am greedy now.
> 
> you told me you loved me—breath hot against my ear, soaped chest pressed to my back. 
> 
> i believed you—became a spluttering, stuttering mess.
> 
> that scared me.
> 
> because I knew then, that I loved you too.
> 
> _


	5. premonition

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _that 'a man in love is the most dangerous of all.'_

> _
> 
> IV.
> 
> why? 
> 
> fuck.
> 
> yes, eloquent. 
> 
> it isn't that I cannot understand why I did, why I fell for you, everything about you—I can. but why this life? why now, when I am terrified that with each transformation, or by each flash of anger that passes through your eyes—
> 
> that I will lose you.
> 
> i believe I grasp it, though, why I had never thought much on love. Because it was impractical—is impractical, yet with you, I find myself turning a blind eye to my irrationality. 
> 
> you are turning me into a dangerous man, eren jaeger. 
> 
> it sounds like some cliché your little blond friend would spout off the top of his head with a wiggle of his eyebrows—that 'a man in love is the most dangerous of all.' 
> 
> .  
> .  
> .  
> post script—if he ever says that after you've found this, i hope to the walls that you get some semblance of a laugh from my oddly, not so endearing premonition. 
> 
> _


	6. bitter

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _it was not bitter._

> _
> 
> V. 
> 
> today i told you what i had known months ago—what i'd been longing to say, but could not find it within myself to utter. 
> 
> humanity's strongest—yet cannot say three words that will always hold true when speaking to you. 
> 
> i believe myself weak in the moments i had wanted to show attention to my love for you, eren. 
> 
> weak because i could not bring the words from my lips, though i'd been desperate to, just as desperately as i am in love with you. 
> 
> you had held me, whispering nothings that meant more than you can ever, and will ever know.
> 
> little things that save me.
> 
> hot breath against my ear—goosebumps.
> 
> i said it then. 
> 
> your mouth dropped open, and you had stared at me as if i carried the ocean you always speak of within my soul. 
> 
> —followed by my hot breath, and muffled 'i love you's' into the mattress. your body moving painstakingly slow against mine. 
> 
> you'd kissed me afterwards, telling me i tasted bitter—of tobacco and tea. 
> 
> you said you didn't mind.
> 
> i smiled then.
> 
> or so you told me. 
> 
> and as you pulled me back to your frame, you whispered—
> 
> 'I love you like that.'
> 
> it was not bitter. 
> 
> _

> 


	7. cabin

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _—and i knew that my goddamn voice had cracked as i looked at you._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I feel like this has a different vibe from the other entries.

> _
> 
> VI.
> 
> today was spent on inconsequential talk of a future we both knew that we could never have—but in the moment that you spoke of a life, with me for company, i could not resist a word you'd uttered. 
> 
> your eyes were wide, and happy. i'll never know how you manage, but as you spoke, you shined—cliché, but utterly provable. 
> 
> arms wrapping around my neck—you'd whispered, nearly silent—that we should get a cabin in the woods, one your mother would like. i know my arms around you tightened in that moment—recognized it as it happened. 
> 
> i had told you i would love that—and i knew that my goddamn voice had cracked as i looked at you. 
> 
> and you smiled, then. 
> 
> beautiful.
> 
> _


	8. wholeheartedly

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _i accept that i may die any minute, but you, eren. You do not have to._

> _
> 
> VII. 
> 
> you brought me tea in the morning—steaming. 
> 
> told me you loved me—fully. 
> 
> but anger lurked, and hurt was seen. i couldn't comprehend it in the slightest until today, when your body had recoiled as i attempted to fold you into me—it was my fault. 
> 
> i apologized to you—for scaring you, for hurting you in that room those months—those years ago. 
> 
> you said that wasn't it, your hands shaking—fists then beating into my chest like our horse's hooves on the solid ground.
> 
> you looked at me as if i had hidden the moon from sight, obstructed something beautiful—and in a way, i suppose i had. for the both of us. 
> 
> you asked me, then—why didn't i tell you? why didn't i warn you?
> 
> i couldn't bring myself to speak of the operation—couldn't tell you - wouldn't tell you—
> 
> i needed your happiness like a fire needs oxygen to burn, and my waxing of poetic bullshit is clearly a testament to that—as my chest did blaze at the disappointment on your face, and the frown brought me insanity as those men who believe the walls are our deity—our savior—
> 
> you said i should trust you—fully.
> 
> i said that i did—fully.
> 
> you told me you did not believe me—wholeheartedly. 
> 
> i argued. 
> 
> yet, it was not enough. 
> 
> i hadn't wanted to scare you with news of my departure, but i didn't consider—should have considered—your strength, your anger. 
> 
> you could handle it, as you'd lost many important to you. 
> 
> i would not be the first, if i were to go. but that is not a thought meant for paper whose purpose is to provide you comfort, eren— or for battle.
> 
> i accept that i may die any minute, but you, eren. You do not have to. 
> 
> that's why—as you told me that our relationship was broken—i'd believed.
> 
> wholeheartedly.
> 
> _


	9. sunrise

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _happiness was my bedroom at eleven o' clock that night._

> _
> 
> VIII.
> 
> you had come to me with tears streaking your browned cheeks—just the raindrops you'd said, just the rain—a week before i was to leave. 
> 
> i did not refuse your embrace as you apologized—arms wrapping around me - long fingers digging into the fabric of my shirt.
> 
> i did not need the words, though. i'd been in the wrong, i said—and i had. 
> 
> you denied that it was so, but i hadn't considered your individuality—i responded. Simply.
> 
> you had seemed deep in thought, until your lips met mine. 
> 
> it was an apology enough, from the both of us—as we fell back to my mattress, leaning against one another - my lungs constricting, heart rate increasing—
> 
> yet, for the first time in days— 
> 
> i could breathe. 
> 
> i spoke, then - arms shaking—an 'i love you,' passing my cracked lips. 
> 
> you had smiled following—eyes crinkling at the corners, lips curving upward. 
> 
> like the sunrise. 
> 
> happiness was my bedroom at eleven o' clock that night. 
> 
> —anywhere you are
> 
> is where i want to be._


	10. rejoice

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _how else are you to smell the ocean?_

> _IX._
> 
> _it is the final night before i am leaving—to go outside the walls._
> 
> _you know you must stay here, as erwin deemed it necessary - yet i can see it eating at you. you want to pursue, and protect._
> 
> _it is not needed, my love._
> 
> _i am a man of my word—or at least i hope to be. and i have promised that i will fight with every tattered bit of me to return to you, eren._
> 
> _i do not want you to be afraid - do not want you to fret over what you cannot control._
> 
> _all i desire, more than anything between these godforsaken walls, is for you to feel that i look at you the same you do me— like i've just placed the moon in the sky, and filled an endless expanse of land with the ocean you're so enamored with—drawing breathlessness in more closely, wave by crashing wave._
> 
> _i have been loved too fondly by you, to fear my death—though leaving you behind is what i fear - have feared, most of all._
> 
> _if we part, eren—do not forget to inhale. breathe. how else are you to smell the ocean? to taste the salt on your tongue?_
> 
> _live._
> 
> _smile. —and rejoice._


	11. him

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _he is beautiful._

> _
> 
> X. 
> 
> he makes words sound beautiful without even trying. —god, maria, what did i do - to deserve this. 
> 
> small, toothy grins—softening of eyes like leaves in the early summer. 
> 
> he is beautiful.
> 
> this life is not - some might say. though, i believe that it is. i fight for this breath of mine—always have. 
> 
> beauty is not always visible—but it is seen - nearly tangible - in our enjoyment. i find it in every day - in the joy of my comrades, the racing of my heart—within him. 
> 
> i leave this morning - aching, with nothing in my bones—except the will to live.
> 
> and return to my friends - my makeshift family.
> 
> and him. 
> 
> Eren.
> 
> I will.
> 
> _


	12. end

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _'I love you.'_

_The body of a young boy—no, a young man, now—shifted slowly across the creaking mattress, his hands gripping the journal like a lifeline –fingers paled, blood rushing from the pressured points._

_The sheets were wrinkled, and he just knew—that if he had been here, they'd be perfect—pressed and downy._

_But, he was no longer with him._

_So the young man placed the journal on the small, antique nightstand next to the bed he'd been resting in—his long strands of brown hair falling down to bright eyes - like leaves turned in early spring._

_He thought of how the once-fresh ink felt beneath his now calloused fingers—how he wished he could hear the words coming from the other man's mouth, framed by thin lips with an ever-changingly rare curve at the corners._

_'I love you,' he whispered into the air of his captain's chambers—their bedroom._

_His words were heard by no one except for a small ladybug perched on the sill._

_'I love you.'_

_His voice cracked._

_'I love you, Levi.'_

_And Eren smiled._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I enjoyed the heck out of writing this, so thanks for reading.


End file.
